Raise your voices! Civilian protest in civil wars

Abstract

Under what conditions do protests occur in civil wars? Evidence from case studies suggests that protests can indeed play an important role in contexts of civil wars, with civilians using respective tactics both against the state and rebels. We argue that localities experiencing armed clashes are likely to see protest events in the same month. Civilians conduct protests due to battle-related changes in the local opportunity structures and grievances related to losses experienced through collateral damage. Using spatially disaggregated data on protest and battle events in African civil wars, we find support for our hypothesis that battles trigger civilian protests. This effect is robust to the inclusion of a comprehensive list of confounding variables and alternative model specifications, including the use of different temporal and spatial units. Our findings highlight the role of the civilian population and the spatial relationship between war events and protests in civil wars.